


Chasing Down the Demons

by bearpantaloons



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F, Storm Chasing, Twister AU, but not for long oh ho ho!, kara and lena are separated, we got cows
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-12
Updated: 2021-03-12
Packaged: 2021-03-20 09:42:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30002958
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bearpantaloons/pseuds/bearpantaloons
Summary: For Lena, former storm chaser-turned-weatherwoman, everything was falling into place. She had a new job, a new fiancée, a new truck, but there was one thing standing in between her and her new life: Kara Danvers.Twister AU
Relationships: Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor
Comments: 13
Kudos: 65





	Chasing Down the Demons

**Author's Note:**

> Making all of our favorite 90's films gay, one fic at a time. Updates for this may be slightly irregular, but I'm trying to write. I really am. If you haven't seen the movie, it's all good, but you're missing out on Helen Hunt in her prime.
> 
> Fic title from "Twisted" by Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham
> 
> Hope you enjoy. :)

As Lena drives down a narrow two-lane road in a rural area she’s never been to before, she stares at her left hand that’s gripping the steering wheel. There’s a tan line where her wedding ring used to sit, a reminder of a failed marriage to go along with the discarded divorce papers in her glove compartment that she’d forgotten about until recently. That’s the reason why she’s driving out in the middle of nowhere, actually. She’s engaged again, but this time to an Argentinian psychologist who rarely puts her phone down. Lena’s told Andrea that giving out her phone number to her patients is a recipe for disaster, but Andrea is dedicated to her work and Lena can’t really argue with that. She used to be dedicated to hers just as much.

But that was before.

Now, she’s decided to settle down, stop chasing ghosts, but in order to do that, she needs those forgotten divorce papers signed. And that’s why she’s where she is now – in her newly-purchased truck with her newly-acquired fiancée chirping beside her, trying to calm one storm after another.

Dark clouds start rolling in above them, so Lena is certain that the team will still be in the area, and it doesn’t take much longer before she spots the caravan of vehicles parked off to the side in a dirt field. Lena pulls up and parks next to the other vehicles and waits for Andrea to get off the phone.

“You don’t have to come down. I’ll just get her to sign the papers and we’ll be on our way.”

“And miss meeting the infamous Kara Danvers? No way, I’m coming,” Andrea responds cheerfully. Lena internally groans while she exits the truck, grabbing the divorce papers before she leaves.

“Are you nervous about seeing her?” Andrea asks.

“Who, Kara? No. Why, do I look nervous?” Lena runs a hand through her long hair… nervously. Andrea just curls her lip into a smirk and shakes her head.

“Not at all, _querida_.”

Their feet crunch on the dirt as they slowly walk up to Lena’s former crewmates. Music blares from one of the vehicles, some obnoxiously loud rock song. Winn is standing on top of a van, trying to tinker with a doppler radar and looks like he nearly shocks himself to death with one of the wires and James sits inside, laughing. One of the younger members, Nia, is the first one to look up from a map and a big, bright grin spreads across her face.

“Lena! Holy shit, you’re back.”

Lena chuckles. “I’m not back. Hey, have you seen Kara?”

“Yeah, she’s around here somewhere. Come look at all our new gear!”

“Maybe later, I’m kind of in a hurry,” Lena says regretfully. She really has missed Nia and the gang. The years she spent with them were some of the best she’s ever had, but that’s all in the past now. She looks around to try and find her soon-to-be-ex-wife, but is cut off by Brainy.

“Lena, it is good to see you.”

Lena smiles politely. “Uh, thanks, Brainy. Have you seen—”

“Things have not been the same without you. Kara has been very cranky since you left. I worry she’s becoming a curmudgeon way before her time. Perhaps you being back will soften her edges again.” He walks away before she can say anything.

“I’m not back,” she mumbles to no one in particular. Andrea gently rubs her back and it comforts Lena well enough.

The angry looking clouds keep rolling in and it hides almost all of the sunlight, darkening everything around them. If Lena believed in bad omens, this would definitely be one of them. She isn’t looking where she’s going and bumps into someone.

“Geez, watch where you’re going!”

Lena’s faced with the second to last person she wanted to see: Kara’s sister. “Alex,” she greets stonily.

“Luthor. What the hell are you doing here?”

Lena holds up the divorce papers. “Came to get Kara to sign these.”

Alex scoffs. “So, you drove all the way out here to get it? You know there’s something called the mail.”

Resisting the urge to roll her eyes, Lena answers, “You and I both know that Kara doesn’t stay in one place long enough to even know where the mailbox is. Listen, I know you and I were never really close, but I need you to know that I never meant to hurt her.”

Alex bristles and Lena’s worried she’s going to take a swing when Kara bursts out of one of the trailers, screaming something about “the big one”. She skids to a sudden stop when she sees Lena and her mouth hangs open. No one says anything for a few seconds until Andrea breaks through the silence like a wrecking ball.

“Is this her?” Andrea asks, crossing her arms and giving Kara a once over. “Huh, I get it.” It jolts Lena’s attention back to the task at hand and holds up the divorce papers.

“I need you to sign these.”

“Nice to see you, too,” Kara answers dryly.

Lena huffs in annoyance. “Sorry, hi. The crew looks good. This is my fiancée, Andrea. Can you please sign the divorce papers?”

“Yeah, yeah, sure. Oh, wow! Look at the size of that thing,” Kara exclaims while reaching out to grab Andrea’s hand and examining her engagement ring. “This must have cost a fortune. I’m guessing corporate life is treating you well.”

It’s a jab meant to irritate Lena, but she does her best to not take the bait. Ever since she quit storm chasing, she’s been called everything from a traitor to a sell-out. No better than Max Lord, some said. It stung at first, but she was doing what she thought was right by walking away. She and Kara were constantly arguing, making the team uncomfortable. When they mutually agreed to separate, they decided not to go through with a full divorce, because it would be more work than either one of them really wanted to deal with at the time, but now that Lena was engaged to Andrea, it’s necessary. She needs to stay put, have a steady job that doesn’t involve nearly killing herself every time she goes out. So, she took a job as a meteorologist with the local news station. It’s not quite as thrilling a job, but it’ll pay the bills.

“It is, thanks,” Lena answers humorlessly.

“Lee, honey, is this going to take long?” Andrea asks, looking around at the desolate area they’ve arrived at.

Kara looks up at both of them with an indescribable look, turns to Alex and mouths _Lee?_ Alex just shrugs while Kara hides her fake gagging gesture.

Lena has to admit, being back around the crew and the excitement of chasing another tornado awakens something that’s been buried deep inside of her for the past few years. She misses it – the thrill, the chase, being around a team who gets her, rather than the stuffy old men she’s forced to grin and bear at her new job. It almost, _almost_ makes her want to come back, but she knows she’s no longer welcome here.

Kara takes the papers over to the hood of her truck and slaps them down on the hood, taking a pen out of her shirt pocket and pulling the cap off with her teeth. She flips through the first few pages.

“Geez, this thing is wordy.”

“I’ve marked where you need to sign,” Lena points to the little sticky flags hanging off the edges of the pages.

“Uh-huh,” Kara answers mindlessly, still scanning the legal jargon written everywhere. She signs on one line and Lena breathes a silent sigh of relief. Finally. Andrea’s standing off to the side speaking to someone – or, rather, being spoken to.

“Oh, god,” Lena groans.

Kara looks up and chuckles. “I see Andrea is getting acquainted with Brainy.” She’s about to sign another line when the door to the trailer slams open and Nia, runs out.

“Kara! We gotta go.”

“Is this it?” she yells back.

“This is it,” Nia confirms. Kara gathers all of the papers up and speeds off in another direction. Lena doesn’t know what’s happening, but she follows Kara.

“Kara, wait, I need you to sign those.”

“Can we do it after?” Kara asks, not looking back. “We’ve only got one chance for this. Oh, shoot! I didn’t even show you. Come here,” she gestures toward the back of her truck and tears off the burlap tarp covering the machine. Inside is a large cylinder with a clear top, and on the side is a painted tornado with… sharks?

“Is that—”

Kara nods enthusiastically. “Sharknado! It’s your baby.”

“How the hell did you get it done? It was just in its infancy when I left.”

“I had some help,” Kara replies and lifts the lid up. “Check out the sensors.” She pulls one out and hands it to Lena. It’s a small, metal sphere, about the size of a golf ball with small antennae poking out of it.

“These are amazing, Kara. This whole thing is incredible.”

“Well, we had the right blueprints,” Kara says with a crooked smile. “We were able to make four of them.”

Alex’s voice interrupts their moment with a shrill yell. “Are you going to load up, or are we just going to wait for the tornado to run over us?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m goin’!” Kara yells back. She turns toward Lena again. “Are you coming? Thought you might want to see it in action.”

Lena takes one longing look over at Sharknado I, but shakes her head. “No, we have to get back. Good luck, though.”

Kara smiles slightly and shrugs. “Suit yourself.” She climbs into her truck and starts the engine. She speaks into her walkie talkie to get a headcount and make sure everyone’s ready. She leans out of the window. “Brainy, you’re always the last one. Come on!”

“Yes, that is because I’m always the most thorough,” he says, jogging to one of the vans with an armful of maps. “You would be lost without me!”

The vehicles start driving off and Kara gives one last wave out of her window as she follows the rest of the team out. As the dust settles, Lena’s nerves also settle and she’s about to head back to the truck, when Andrea speaks up.

“Did she sign the papers?”

A look of dread and frustration washes over Lena’s face as she sees the caravan getting smaller and smaller.

“Shit, if we hurry, we can probably catch up to them.” She jumps into the truck and peels out, chasing after the storm chasers down rural Oklahoma.

* * *

“Tell me again why it was your job to drive straight into a tornado?” Andrea says.

“That thing back there?” Lena points to the cab of Kara’s truck. “It was my life’s work. I was working on it years before you and I met – hell, even before Kara and I met. Those sensors inside are supposed to get sucked up inside the funnel of the tornado and give us readings that will allow us to learn more about them – the way they move, how they form, everything. If this works, it’ll give a much bigger window to warn people when tornadoes are forming and where they’re going to hit. It’s important information that no one has ever been able to gather.”

“Is this about your brother?”

Lena’s hands grip the steering wheel tighter. She knows a simple comment like that shouldn’t anger her, but it does. Even after all these years, the mere mention of her father raises her walls up. Kara’s really the only one who ever understood.

“Not everything is about him,” Lena manages to mumble through her gritted teeth. Luckily, Andrea gets a phone call then and the conversation is dropped for the time being. Lena pulls over to the side to pass the others, to try and get to Kara’s truck when she hears cheers as she passes.

“Good to see you back,” James shouts at her and Winn whoops from the passenger seat.

“I am _not_ back,” Lena replies, but suppresses a smile. They finally pull up next to Kara’s truck and Lena honks the horn. Kara lowers her window – the truck being so old that she has to use the manual crank.

“Changed your mind?” Kara asks, the wind whipping her hair into her face.

“You didn’t give me the papers,” Lena tries to yell over all the noise. Kara holds a hand up to her hear and then grabs her radio, showing it to Lena, then holding up a number with her fingers to signal the channel she’s on. Lena huffs and switches her radio to the correct station. “I need the divorce papers, Kara!”

“Oh, shoot, yeah sorry. I’ll get them to you after this.”

Lena sighs and hangs up the radio again before turning her head to Andrea. “Once we catch up to them, you can take the truck and head back. I’ll get the papers and meet you later tonight.”

“I don’t know, this is kind of exciting. It’s not everyday you get to chase a tornado, especially as a therapist.”

Lena’s about to protest when she sees another caravan of black SUVs start to pass them, windows tinted and freshly washed.

“Son-of-a-bitch,” Lena mutters. One of the vehicles passes with its window down and a sleazy looking man smirks and nods his head as they pass.

“Who’s that?” Andrea asks.

The corners of Lena’s lips turn down into a frown and she resists the urge to spit when she says his name. “Maxwell Lord, corporate sell-out. He’s in it for the money, not the science.” What she doesn’t tell Andrea is that Max used to work with both her and Kara years ago. They’d worked together on the preliminary design of Sharknado, but he left before anything was actually built. He started his own team and got corporate sponsorships to buy fancy technology and equipment that both she and Kara scoffed at. _You can’t substitute ingenuity with money_ , Kara used to say. Seeing him again is bringing up old feelings from the past and Lena’s not quite ready to deal with them yet, so she pushes them down and picks up her radio to warn Kara.

“Kara, we got company. Max is heading your way.”

“That-that _jerk_ ,” Kara exclaims. Before Lena can say anything else, one of Max’s caravan vehicles swerves into her space and drives her off the road.

“Shit, hold on!” She does her best to not spin out, but she runs over a sharp rock and knows she just got a flat. She slams her hand on the steering wheel and remembers Andrea’s sitting next to her. “Jesus, sorry, are you okay?”

Clearly shaken, Andrea smiles and nods. “I’m fine. Does that happen a lot?”

“No, that was probably his way of welcoming me back.” She climbs out of the truck and looks down at her flat tire, kicking it. “Damn it.”

It takes the tow truck over an hour to get to them, traveling from the nearest town over and they ride back with the tow truck. At the auto shop, Lena shells out some money to get them to replace her tire within the next ten minutes, but she turns her head slightly to see Max Lord’s smarmy face grinning at a news camera. He has one of his goons open the sliding door to one of the vans and inside is a sleek, metal container that looks oddly familiar. Lena can’t believe what she’s seeing and rushes over, pushing her way through the small crowd.

“You _asshole_!” She shoves him hard and he backs into the side of the van, but before she can do more damage, one of his men wraps his arms around Lena’s tiny frame and holds her back.

“Well, hello Ms. Luthor. Didn’t expect to see you back around these parts, with your new cushy job and all.”

“This is _my_ design. You stole it.” She wriggles around in the other man’s grip. “Let go of me, your neanderthal.” Kara rushes over and pulls the man off of Lena.

“Real nice, Max. You always do your interviews in front of auto shops, or is this a special occasion?”

Maxwell just smiles and turns back to the news crew. “Here, let me open her up and show you the sensors. When these are released into the tornado, they’ll feed us all of the information and data on wind speed, pressure, dew point temperature. This baby will do it all. Pretty soon, all of the information you’ll be receiving will be from these N.A.D.O. 3’s, even your network, Luthor.”

Lena’s about to rip Maxwell’s head off, but Kara holds her back while Andrea just watches from the side and the rest of the team’s held off by Maxwell’s team.

“I guess we’re done here,” Maxwell says, climbing back into this car. He tips his sunglasses down and stares at Lena. “Might want to start patenting your brilliant ideas. Love your weather reports, by the way.” He drives off with the rest of his team and the news crew starts packing up. Lena wrenches her arm out of Kara’s grip and walks away.

“Is everything okay?” Andrea asks, meeting her halfway.

Lena doesn’t answer and just turns back toward Kara, who she knows is following her. “Did you know about this?”

Kara stops walking and holds her hands up in front of her. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I thought the team and I could handle it and we’d get it up way before them. And I didn’t want to bother you with it.”

Lena is absolutely livid. Her hands are shaking at her sides and she’s breathing out her nose to try and calm herself. She doesn’t want to lose it in front of Andrea. She doesn’t want to revert to the person she was before they met. That person was careless, reckless, didn’t think about any one else’s well-being, much less her own. All she wanted was for her ideas to work and she didn’t care how it got there. And, yes, perhaps some of that drive did come from her brother and he was the reason why she wanted to succeed so badly, but she would never admit to that.

Everything she’s done has been on her own terms and with her own two hands. No family legacy or tragedy was the reason why she was so good at what she did. Her father always told her she had a sixth sense for weather, could always sense when a storm was coming, but a lot of good that did her. When she looks over to her side, Kara’s looking at her knowingly with guilt written all over her face.

“I’ll give you one day to get it in the air. After that, I’m gone.”


End file.
